


no room for words

by thewayaround



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Arthur Knows About Merlin's Magic (Merlin), Canon Compliant, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, I'm Bad At Tagging, Light Angst, M/M, POV Arthur Pendragon (Merlin), Post-Canon, Probably ooc, Slow Build, also arthur comes back in this one, and i'm rewatching the show to keep me sane during college, honestly i just missed writing these two, i'm giving my entire life story in these tags i'm sorry, it's almost four in the morning and i have class at eleven why am i doing this again, let's not talk about that tho
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-19
Updated: 2020-10-19
Packaged: 2021-03-09 04:42:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,512
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27099058
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thewayaround/pseuds/thewayaround
Summary: ”You’re awake.”He started upon hearing the voice and grabbed for his sword, only to find the space empty.”I was beginning to worry, you know,” the voice continued. “Though I guess that is a common feeling you bring me, you clotpole.”Clotpole.Merlin.He looked up, and sure enough, there he was. Merlin, his feet bare and dressed in clothing similar to the ones Arthur now wore, a soft yet bright smile on his face. He was thin, much thinner than when Arthur saw him last – how much time had passed since then? – and the skin around his eyes was swollen and red. He looked, to put it lightly, utterly dreadful.”Merlin?” Arthur said, more like a question than a statement, shocking himself with the graininess that came when he spoke. His throat screamed in protest, yet he continued. “What happened? Where are we?” He peeled back the bedclothes once more, gesturing to his clothing with a sluggish hand. “What are wewearing?”
Relationships: Merlin/Arthur Pendragon (Merlin)
Comments: 9
Kudos: 204





	no room for words

**Author's Note:**

> here i am, once again (kudos if you get that reference btw).
> 
> i missed writing about these two, so please take this quick little thing i wrote while avoiding homework.
> 
> and while you're here, check out some of my other merlin fics. or any of my fics, honestly. i promise they're good. also, this was not beta read and like i said in the tags, it is almost four in the morning, so i got sloppy with editing. please let me know in the comments if you see any errors, i am Begging.
> 
> okay, thanks, here's the fic now.

When Arthur came back, he was alone.

He woke at the bottom of Avalon with screaming lungs, weighed down by rusted chainmail and armor. His chest, and his throat, and his body ached as he reached for the surface, kicking desperately and shedding metal as he went.

When he did eventually break the surface, the skin of his face was hit with a wave of cold air. He gagged when he sucked in the first breath of air, then tried again, slower, only to gag again as he swam for the bank.

The gasp that rattled from his throat when his hand made contact with the bank was overwhelming, bile and water rising from his stomach as he choked. Eventually, when his stomach and chest settled, the first full breath of air filled his lungs, and the adrenaline seeped from his body, and he collapsed face-first into the mud.

The chill in the air seeped through his clothes and into his bones, leaving him shivering and exhausted where he lay, his legs still in the water. It was dark, but his sight was too blurred to find the position of the moon, and his mind was too tired to calculate the time, so he closed his eyes and let the exhaustion overtake him.

* * *

He woke again, unaware of how much time had passed, to a hand on his arm and another on his back. It was just as dark as before, but a bright light now illuminated the air around him, blue and excruciating on his eyes. The noise he made upon seeing it was one his father would be disappointed to hear, but whoever had their hands on him breathed out in clear relief, then let out a sob.

”Arthur,” they choked out, and he knew that voice. The owner was there, somewhere, buried in the water-logged depths of his mind. “Arthur, I’m here.”

He was too tired to find the face belonging to that voice, both on the land and in his mind, and instead succumbed to sleep once more.

* * *

The final time he awoke, he was in a bed. It was small and strange, his body not recognizing it nor the bedclothes over him. The clothes on his body were also strange. The tunic was thin and white, with cropped sleeves that closed too tightly around his biceps. When he peeled back the bedclothes, the trousers on his legs were soft and gray, too large around his shins. A string sat on the waistband, all but the ends tucked under the fabric.

”You’re awake.”

He started upon hearing the voice and grabbed for his sword, only to find the space empty.

”I was beginning to worry, you know,” the voice continued. “Though I guess that is a common feeling you bring me, you clotpole.”

Clotpole. _Merlin_.

He looked up, and sure enough, there he was. Merlin, his feet bare and dressed in clothing similar to the ones Arthur now wore, a soft yet bright smile on his face. He was thin, much thinner than when Arthur saw him last – how much time had passed since then? – and the skin around his eyes was swollen and red. He looked, to put it lightly, utterly dreadful.

”Merlin?” Arthur said, more like a question than a statement, shocking himself with the graininess that came when he spoke. His throat screamed in protest, yet he continued. “What happened? Where are we?” He peeled back the bedclothes once more, gesturing to his clothing with a sluggish hand. “What are we _wearing_?”

Moments passed with silence, but before Arthur could speak again, Merlin bounded across the room and fell into him, arms tight around his neck.

The suddenness of the grip surprised him, but not so much as the drips of hot tears that splashed the exposed skin of his neck.

He doesn’t know what to do with his hands, and they stay slack by his sides for just a moment. Eventually, when he realizes Merlin won’t be letting him go anytime soon, he reaches and holds tightly. Thin shoulder blades dig into the heels of his palm, and he presses his nose into Merlin’s shoulder and _breathes_.

They’ve been here before, he thinks. It feels too familiar to not have been.

* * *

”I have to tell you something,” Merlin says later, sitting at the end of the bed. The weight held the bedclothes tight around Arthur’s legs.

His throat was dry. His limbs were weak and uncooperative. “What is it?”

Merlin swallowed, his throat bobbing as he stared down at his hands. One hand was curled in his lap, the other picking absently at the nailbeds. Arthur wanted to reach out, fearful Merlin would eventually draw blood. He kept his hands to his sides.

”Arthur…” Merlin swallowed again, still picking at his nails. “You’ve been… _gone_ … for nearly 1500 years.”

At first, there was nothing; an absence of any feelings overtook him. Then, confusion.

”What do you mean _gone_?” he asked, his mind spinning. 1500 _years _.__

Merlin swallowed. “Dead, asleep, somewhere in between,” he whispered. “In Avalon. I don’t know.”

”What do you mean _you don’t know_?” Arthur spat, filled with sudden, boiling rage.

”I don’t know!” Merlin shouted, voice full of emotion Arthur’s angered mind was too hot to decipher.

It was silent for a few moments, nothing but the sounds of their ragged breathing to fill the room – Arthur’s stemmed from anger, and Merlin’s from some wounded part of him buried deep in his soul.

”Leave me,” Arthur mumbled, twisting away from him.

”Arthur—“

”I said _leave me_!” he shouted, and Merlin did.

* * *

Later, when the anger had stemmed to a minimum, able-to-converse amount, he called Merlin back to the room and prepared for the answers.

”After Camlann, and Mordred, and Morgana, you…” He trailed off, his bottom lip tugged between his teeth so sharply blood was drawn. “You _died_ , Arthur. We were so close, _I_ was close, and you just—“

Something akin to a sob came from him. The anger still resided in Arthur.

”The others,” Arthur mumbled. “Gaius, the knights… Guinevere.”

Merlin shakes his head, sharp and quick. “Gaius shortly after you. He was sick, too sick for me to—” He pauses, biting down on his lip again. “Gwaine the same day as you. He and Percival, they went after Morgana. Leon led the knights in your place. He went in the final battle before Camelot fell.”

”Camelot fell?” Arthur asked, his voice croaked and filled with a mixture of emotions.

Merlin nodded, reaching to wipe stray tears from beneath his eyes. “Gwen, she never remarried. The neighboring kingdoms found Camelot weak, especially once… magic was legalized again.”

”Magic,” Arthur murmured. Magic. That’s right. Merlin… had magic. “You were a sorcerer.”

”I was,” Merlin whispered. “I am. Still. That’s why she legalized it.” He took in a shaky breath. “She made me court sorcerer. We allied with the Druids.”

”The Druids,” Arthur said, more to himself than to Merlin. He fell back onto the pillows beneath him, letting out a deep exhale.

”I know it probably isn’t what you want to hear, but it worked. For a while, anyway. The kingdoms… the alliances broke. They attacked.”

”What happened to Guinevere? When Camelot fell?”

Merlin shook his head, picking at his nails again. Eventually, he turned to look at Arthur. “I tried to get her to leave, Arthur,” he said, voice quick and panicked. “You have to understand that. I _tried_ , please believe me.”

”Merlin,” Arthur interrupted. “Tell me what happened.”

Merlin breathed in, but his eyes never left Arthur’s. “She wanted to protect the people,” he said, “and she did. The citadel was lost, and Gwen was lost with it.”

His breath was gone with Merlin’s words, and eventually, his heart went with them, too.

* * *

It had been three weeks, and adjusting was hard. There were too many things Arthur couldn’t comprehend.

The first time he left the strange chambers – Merlin told him it was called a bedroom now, not chamber – he panicked.

There was too much strange technology, too many sights in Merlin’s small home. There were voices from above, from beside, and music blaring from somewhere outside. He looked out the window once and was met with the few of a massive city, tall towers where people worked and lived, and people in strange clothing. He threw a lamp at the wall, watched it shatter, then had to go back to the bedroom to cry.

”I’m sorry,” he told Merlin when he left the room later. He watched the other man paste the lamp back together.

”You don’t have to be,” Merlin replied, placing the bottle of paste on the floor and holding two of the ceramic shards together. “I know that this is… a lot.”

Arthur nodded, moving to sit on the sofa. He considered drawing his legs up, just for a moment, then sighed and placed his palms flat on his thighs.

”How are you here, Merlin?” he asked, then watched the other man tense. “Did you… were you… I don’t know. Reborn?”

Merlin shook his head, short and quick. “No, I, um,” he stuttered, “I never… died. I just have been. Here.”

”For 1500 years?”

Merlin nodded. “After a while, I noticed everyone around me was aging – growing older – and I was just… stuck. Over the years, I used spells. Made myself older, then younger, moved homes, disappeared. I used names no one would remember and made myself scarce. No one knows the difference when you live like that.”

Arthur sat for a moment, processing the words. Then he said, quietly, “You’ve been alone?”

Merlin shrugged. “People come and go,” he said, just as quiet as Arthur if not more so. “It’s hard to be close to people when you never die.”

* * *

After two months, he began to get the hang of things. Merlin worked, he found out, at a small store a few streets over, selling books and sweet drinks. He got Arthur a cellphone, which he still had not been able to use. Each time it scanned his face to unlock, he wanted to throw it at the wall.

”You’re like an old person trying to work a smartphone,” Merlin had laughed when Arthur had held the thing a full arm's length away from himself.

”I _am_ old, _Merlin_ ,” he had replied, and it just made the man laugh harder.

He wasn’t allowed to touch the stove after he burned himself on it – “We’ll work up to that,” Merlin had told him while he ran cold water over Arthur’s stinging palm – but he knew how to work the microwave.

The television was his favorite thing.

”You’re telling me I can watch plays on this thing?” he had asked, and Merlin had laughed.

”Yes, but they aren’t plays,” he had replied, a smile on his face as he taught Arthur how to use the remote. “They’re television shows. Like plays, only filmed.”

”Filmed?”

”Like a moving painting that speaks. Remind me to show you _Harry Potter_.”

And that’s how it went. For months, Arthur learned, and he adapted, and he desperately missed the home he once knew.

* * *

The day the first snow fell, they went to Avalon.

It had taken Merlin an hour to convince Arthur his carriage – a car, he was told, like a carriage without the horses and ran with electricity – would not be the death of them. He allowed Arthur to turn the knobs on the radio, laughed at him when he found a station with a man screaming over a beat of the music, then stopped to play music from his own cellphone. It was music similar to the music of Camelot. Celtic, Merlin had told him.

Once they reached the lake, the air was brisk and biting, much like it was when Arthur had risen from the waters a year before. He pulled his coat tighter around his body, then adjusted the cloth hat over his ears.

The water was still and glasslike, pristine in glory.

”It’s beautiful,” Arthur said.

Merlin stayed still and silent beside him.

It was late in the day, the sun beginning to set over the lake’s horizon.

Merlin was staring at his shoes.

Arthur dropped a hand on his shoulder, and the man started. “Are you alright?”

Merlin stared at him for a moment, then nodded short and quick. Arthur furrowed his eyebrows. “Merlin, I know you,” he said. “I can tell something is bothering you.”

”It’s nothing,” Merlin whispered.

”It’s something. I’m not an idiot, you know?”

Merlin chuckled, “I know.”

* * *

The ride back to the city was silent, almost deadly. Tension hung heavy in the air, around Merlin, and Arthur didn’t know what to do.

* * *

”Why were you like that? At Avalon?”

Merlin picked at the rice on his plate, pushing at it with the prongs of his fork. “Like what?” he asked, not looking up.

Arthur thought for a moment, trying to figure out what to say. “Quiet,” he finally decided on. “Withdrawn.”

Merlin didn’t respond for a few moments, then dropped his fork. “You were never there,” he eventually said, voice choked. Reserved. “I waited. I went to the lake every time there was a war or a catastrophe. ‘Take heart,’ Kilgharrah told me, ‘for when Albion’s need is greatest, Arthur will rise again.’ But you were never there, and I was alone, trusting nothing but the memory of someone centuries dead.”

”I wasn’t dead,” Arthur said, voice just as tight as Merlin’s. “I came back. You _knew_ I would come back. How could I be dead?”

Merlin stared at him, just for a moment, then he stood. Arthur watched him scrape his plate clean into the garbage, drop it in the dishwasher, and then leave the room, disappearing into the hallway that leads to the bedroom.

He didn’t come back.

* * *

Arthur found him in the bed, under the blankets with his back to the door. The lights were off, save for a small lamp on the bedside table.

He knew Merlin was awake.

The mattress dipped under his weight when he sat on it, facing the door.

”I’m sorry,” he said, looking over his shoulder to the back of Merlin’s head.

He didn’t reply.

”I remember,” Arthur continued. “Camlann. Mordred. Dying. I remember it.”

Merlin still didn’t say anything.

“I know how hard that day was for you, Merlin.”

He watched the other man turn his face into the pillow, and then his shoulder shook with a sudden sob.

”You don’t know,” he choked, voice muffled into the pillowcase. “You don’t know, Arthur. You don’t know what it’s like.”

”Then _tell me_ ,” Arthur said, twisting to pull on Merlin’s shoulder. To make Merlin face him. “Talk to me, Merlin.”

Merlin stared at him, then looked up to the ceiling, his face crumpling. “You died in my _arms_ ,” he choked. “We were _so close_ , we would have made it.”

The funny thing about Arthur’s memory is that it came back in pieces. He remembered those days before he died; the stab, the dragon, Morgana, Merlin’s magic. But there were holes, gaps in his memory that he couldn’t recall.

And, suddenly – pushed by Merlin’s words – he remembers. The Sidhe in Avalon. They could have saved him. But the horses were gone, they lost too much time, and it was there, in that field just at the forest edge, that he couldn’t go on anymore.

”We—” he starts, then gets choked up and has to swallow. “We wouldn’t have. It was too late for me, Merlin.”

”We _could have_!” Merlin shouts, sitting up and staring straight at Arthur. “If I had been faster, if I had called for Kilgharrah sooner—“

Arthur grabs him and pulls him against him, arms wrapped tightly around his shoulders.

Merlin sobs once, then chokes, sobs again. Then, the tears come freely, wetting Arthur’s shirt.

* * *

He wakes up with the blankets folded over his limbs and the lamp out. When he turns, the door is open and light floods over the walls.

The small clock on the bedside table says it is midnight.

He stands, slow and sluggish, pushing the blankets aside. Merlin is awake, curled into the corner of the sofa with a blanket over his legs. His eyes are on the television, but the gaze is absent.

Arthur clears his throat, and Merlin starts. “Are you alright?”

Merlin stares at him for a moment, then looks down at his lap, picking at a thread on the blanket. “No,” he whispers.

Arthur moves to sit beside him. He looks at the television. A woman is spreading icing on an extravagant looking cake. He looks back to Merlin.

”Do you want me to stay with you?”

Merlin doesn’t say anything.

Arthur watches him for a moment, then blows out a loud breath. “Alright, I guess that answers it,” he says, then tugs the end blanket from beneath Merlin’s legs and over his own.

”Arthur—“

”Shut up, Merlin,” he interrupts. “I won’t allow you to be alone in this state.”

Thankfully, Merlin does, and eventually, he drifts, falling into Arthur’s side.

* * *

He wakes up to Merlin whispering, and his body feels light. “What are you doing?” he asks, and his weight snaps back, knocking the wind from him. “What the _hell_ , _Mer_ lin? Were you using magic on me?”

”I was trying to move you to the bedroom,” Merlin says. Arthur stares at him, his face twisted. Merlin shrugs. “You’re heavy.”

”Thanks,” Arthur spits, shoving the blanket from his legs.

He starts down the hall, and that’s when he realizes Merlin is settling back onto the couch. “What are you doing?” he asks, watching the other man place one of the throw pillows flat on the cushions.

”Getting ready to sleep,” Merlin replies, reaching for a second pillow.

”You sleep on the sofa?”

Merlin stares at him for a moment. “You’re using my bedroom,” he says like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. It is.

Arthur stares back. He’s fallen asleep on that couch before. He woke up a few hours later with pain shooting up his spine.

”You can’t sleep there,” he says, and Merlin scoffs.

”What am I supposed to do, Arthur?” he asks, hands on his hips. He gestures to the hall. “Share the bed with you?”

Arthur ponders for a moment, then decides, “It’s big enough.”

”You’re joking,” Merlin laughs.

”I’m not,” Arthur replies, voice serious. Merlin stares at him like he’s grown an extra head, and he sighs. “You’re going to kill yourself sleeping there. Just share the damn bed, Merlin. We’ll fit.”

* * *

He wakes again later to early morning light staining the closed door. There’s weight behind him, and he flips carefully atop the mattress, rolling onto his opposite side. Merlin is beside him, two pillows shoved between them beneath the blankets. He’s facing Arthur, one hand curled on his pillow, hiding half of his face.

His breathing is even and slow, his ribs moving beneath the blankets with each inhale and exhale. He looks peaceful this way, younger. He looks like the Merlin from 1500 years ago, the one in Arthur’s memories.

The sunlight streams through the blinds in thick lines, leaving streaks across Merlin’s hair, the skin of his shoulder where his shirt sleeve has ridden up during the night, his face.

Arthur can’t tear his eyes away. The sight is familiar, but not from his memories. From a dream, he realizes. One 1500 years gone and dead.

* * *

They go to Avalon again just before the season's change. There is still a chill to the air, the last of winter before it fades.

Merlin tugs his scarf tighter around his neck, and Arthur readjusts the knit cap on his head.

”You said you came each time there was a war,” Arthur says, gazing over the water. He looks to Merlin and finds him doing the same. “There was no war, the night I came back.” Merlin lifts his head, raises his chin. “Why did you come that night?”

Merlin doesn’t look away from the water. “I felt it,” he says. “When you came back. I felt it. Like something pulled on my very soul.”

Arthur watched him, and Merlin finally looks back.

His scarf bunched around his neck, hiding his chin. A breeze blew, and it started to snow.

And Arthur moved.

* * *

He runs.

Once he breaks the kiss he began, Arthur runs.

The snow and the air sting his face. The flakes gather in the tree limbs and on the foliage of the wood’s floor.

He runs until his legs and his lungs burn, and then he stops, letting himself think.

_A dream 1500 years dead and gone._

”Arthur!”

He turns, and Merlin is there, yet before Arthur can speak – apologize, ask for forgiveness, anything – Merlin’s hands are on his face, pulling Arthur in, and there are no room for words.

_A dream 1500 years, not dead nor gone._

Merlin pulls back, his eyes closed. “You have no idea—” he starts, then swallows.

Arthur smiles, hands on either side of Merlin’s neck, and he pulls him in once more.

**Author's Note:**

> come talk to me on my tumblr: sncrlynwtms
> 
> i run an IT blog but please come talk to me about merlin. i need people who watch this show to talk to.


End file.
